Chapter 17
Present Day
I bust Slappy in the jaw and then shake out my hand.
Slappy isn’t his real name.
Sometimes, when I don’t know their names, I give them a nickname. This guy earned the nickname because as soon as I walked in, he started slapping himself on the head and calling himself an idiot.
Slappy’s head jerks to the side, and I hear his neck crack.
It doesn’t snap, just cracks.
His glasses fly off his nose and hit the wall. He cries out in agony, blood flying from his mouth.
The son of a bitch deserves every hit.
My men caught him trying to rob two women in the parking lot.
He had seen them win a few thousand dollars in the casino and found them as easy targets.
I have security guards on every corner of the parking lot, so they easily apprehended and brought him inside.
We have a secret room next to security, where we deal with imbeciles like him.
I’m glad he chose to be a scumbag here and not follow them home.
“I just wanted some cash,” he stutters, blood seeping between his teeth. “I’ll never do it again.”
“If you want cash at a casino, you gamble. Not rob.” I grab my pistol, silencer on the end, and raise it to Slappy’s head.
I don’t give him the chance to plead for his life before pulling the trigger.
As soon as the bullet strikes his skull, blood and brain matter splatter onto the walls, him, and the floor. His body slumps to the side before collapsing off the chair. Lying there, in a black hoodie and pants, fitting the whole robber role, he looks almost like a bunched-up rug.
“Damn, boss,” Franko says in disappointment. “You took it easy on him.”
“He caught me on the wrong night.” I take off the black tee I put on before coming in here and drop it into a basket labeled F .
The F stands for fire since we burn any clothes with even a speck of someone else’s blood on them.
I don’t trust washing machines or dry cleaners to get every stain out. The shirt I wore when I killed Genesis’s attorney is in there too. I make a mental reminder to have Franko throw them in the fireplace.
Slappy was lucky I was pressed for time and had to make his punishment quick. I could’ve spent hours torturing him for his stupidity at my business.
Unfortunately, I have a meeting in New York I need to get to.
“Wrong night because your mind is on a dark-haired baddie who counts cards?” He leans down to pick up Slappy’s glasses and cracks them in half. “What’d you end up doing with her?”
Franko is more than a mere security guard at the casino. He’s one of my closest men, and I trust him. He works strictly for me, not for the Lombardis, and I pay him well for it.
His grandparents owned a casino, and from his teens to his early twenties, he was their security guard until they sold the business.
“Do with who?” I grab a paper towel and wipe my face.
“Oh, come on. It was only hours ago. I doubt you forgot about her.”
I scratch my cheek. “She’s having my baby.”
“Do you mean currently pregnant with your baby, or you just want her to have your baby in the future?”
“Worry about yourself,” I tell him. “But make it clear to security that if they see her on the casino floor, they tell me. No one touches her, or they’re dead.”
“There’s talk about Cernach’s family in Ireland being angry over his death,” Antonio tells Damien and me.
Cernach Koglin was the Irish mob boss whose murder we staged to prevent Damien from marrying Pippa’s cousin, Riona. We thought we’d succeeded and that problem was over.
Seems we were wrong.
The last thing I want to deal with is more Irish assholes.
It’s almost five in the morning, and I haven’t had a wink of sleep. I hoped to make it home before Genesis woke up, to see her in my bed, but I doubt that’ll happen.
I stretch my neck and take a drink of water. “Tell them to take it up with Odhrán, the man who killed him.”
Riona murdered Odhrán, so he should no longer be a problem either.
It was impressive. She’d played the image of the obedient mob princess so well that no one suspected a thing as she plotted her father’s murder.
Now, she’s the boss of the family, the first woman to do it.
So far, she’s still alive. I don’t know how long men will allow her to stay in charge though.
That further proves my belief that you can’t trust anyone.
“This had better not become a problem.” Antonio grits his teeth.
He didn’t want to kill Cernach, but he did it because my brother loved Pippa. Cernach would’ve never allowed them to be together.
Like so many bosses, Antonio thinks of the strength and safety of the family first. He grew up with a cruel father who put him through hell.
But unlike me, he didn’t have a mother who tended to his wounds after.
She gave no fucks if he or his brother showed up to dinner, beaten and bruised.
When Antonio went to war with his uncle, his mother even sold him out.
He never wanted to be the boss. His brother, Vinny, was the oldest and set to take over.
But Vinny was fucking stupid and wanted to be king of New York.
He further lost his mind when his girlfriend, Natalia, left him.
After Natalia got engaged to Cristian, he kidnapped her, and Cristian killed him for it.
I rest my elbows on the table. “I have another problem to add to the list.”
Antonio reclines in his chair and throws his head back. “What now?”
“Dima came to the casino.” I can’t stop myself from clenching my jaw at the memory of him touching Genesis.
“Please tell me it was only to gamble,” Damien says.
Still in a bad mood, I can’t stop myself from glaring at my brother. “If he wanted to gamble, I doubt our place is where he’d choose to go.”
The two nod in understanding.
“He’s watching you,” Antonio states, his tone flat.
“Yaroslav will keep him in line,” Damien says.
“Yaroslav is getting old,” I argue. “Dima knows he’ll be in charge soon.”
Antonio cuts his glare to me. “I wish you’d run the contract with Yaroslav by me before signing it.”
I hold his gaze. “Time was of the essence.”
“Yes, but making hurried, last-minute deals are never well thought out.” He scowls at me. “I have a meeting.” While keeping that scowl on me, he stands and pulls his suit jacket from the back of his chair. “Let’s make sure this doesn’t turn into a war.”
He storms past me and slams the door shut.
Damien stares at me in caution, which pisses me off.
I lean in closer toward him, my face burning. “Look, I’ve sacrificed my life for his family. Every fucking Bellini has. If Antonio wants to give me trouble for this, I won’t help the Lombardis with another goddamn thing.”
He blows out a breath, concern lining his face. “You know Antonio always has your back. He just has a lot on his plate right now.”
I push my chair out with more force than necessary. “If any of you fail to protect my soon-to-be wife, there’ll be problems. If he doesn’t want to protect my family, then I’ll stop protecting his.”
It’s suicide for a man to speak about stepping away from the Mafia.
It’s seen as betrayal.
Very few men have come out of that decision alive.
Damien shakes his head. “Genesis isn’t your wife.”
“It appears I need to solve that problem.”